


Good Morning New York

by neelie415



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Anti-Aging Fic, Canon-Typical Violence, Flashbacks, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Soulmate AU, brunch with Steve and Peggy, elements of comics Hawkeye, mild body horror, oh angsty Bucky I love you, sam and bucky are bros, the gang plays True American, winterhawk - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2019-06-22
Packaged: 2019-08-23 05:11:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16612547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neelie415/pseuds/neelie415
Summary: A take on the soulmate AU where you don't age past 25 until you meet the love of your life. Unfortunately for Bucky, he was born in 1917 and here it is, 2018 and he's still stuck at the ripe old age of 25. After enlisting in the army and serving in every war the United States has been in since WWII, an IED took his arm and also took away his only purpose in life. At least until he meets a young punk named Clinton Francis Barton with a chip on his shoulder and a capacity to get into trouble that rivals Bucky's own.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and welcome to an extremely self-indulgent fic. Shout out to everyone who loves Bucky Barnes and Clint Barton and wants them to be two idiots in love. This is my attempt at getting them there. Enjoy!

_ “Good morning New York! It’s 8 am and a beautiful day outside with blue skies and sunshine. The high today will reach about 82 today and the perfect day to take your S.O. out for—“ _

Bucky slammed his fist down on the alarm clock, cutting it off before he found out what stupid couple activity today would be perfect for. He rubbed his eyes and sat up, blinking around at his tiny apartment. Steve would kill him if he saw how dirty his apartment had gotten in the short time he had been home from the hospital. Bucky resigned himself to cleaning up before Steve and Peggy came over for brunch. Bucky snorted at the thought. Brunch. They really were entering their twilight years gracefully. Laughter lines and crow’s feet around their eyes attested to the long, happy life they had led together. Bucky ignored the long familiar pang of loneliness and slowly got out of bed, being careful to stretch out his shoulder the way the doctors had shown him. He pulled on some sweats and shuffled his way into the kitchen, scratching absently at the bandages they told him were still necessary. 

Just over four months ago the Humvee Bucky had been riding in drove over a landmine and had been blown sky high. He was thrown through the windshield and had the added bonus of a piece of shrapnel lodging itself deep enough in his already shredded arm that when he woke up in a field hospital a couple days later, the surgeon told him that there was no chance of saving his arm. On his flight back to the states he learned that it was his buddy Sam who had pulled him to safety. After serving two tours Sam was due to return home to D.C. at the end of the week. Bucky actually had plans to go down and see him. It was weird, to actually have plans.

After he stumbled around with one arm for about a month, one day Bucky opened his door to find an excited Steve with the news of a study being conducted by some big shot professor at Johns Hopkins who needed volunteers for prosthetics. Bucky would have done anything to make Steve smile again after the  _ incident _ , as Bucky kept calling it, so he agreed. And that was how three months later Bucky was still trying to ignore the pangs of a phantom arm and instead focus on the very real, very new sensation of the metal arm that Stark and his team had designed. 

And then Stark got fired from Johns Hopkins after some illicit affair with a student and Bucky was dropped from the program. 

Having resigned himself to a shitty life anyway, what with the fact that he was born in 1917 and here it was 2018. He still hadn’t found his soulmate and thus was left 25 years old. Bucky accepted the turn of events and the semi functioning left arm. That is, until Stark showed up on his doorstep and insisted on still seeing Bucky once a week to recalibrate his arm. And Bucky had done his damnedest to make his life as normal as possible, the metal arm aside. 

He opened the fridge and sighed when only the site of beer cans and an old greasy pizza box greeted him. He needed to go shopping before Steve and Peggy showed up. Foregoing the pizza, Bucky grabbed a can of beer and opened it, sitting at his rickety table and trying not to feel jealous of Steve for what felt like the millionth time. Steve and Peggy had met nearly seventy years ago, back when Steve and Bucky had been in the army together killing as many Nazis as possible while trying not to get killed in the process. Steve was so good at it and inspiring the boys around him that they christened him Captain America in the waning years of what was now called World War II. Steve was luckier than a lot of guys Bucky had known over the years in more ways than one. But the luckiest thing about him  was that he had only stayed 25 for just under a year before he met Peggy and the two soulmates had begun aging together. For a while he had been content with sharing in Steve’s happiness, being best man at the wedding and attending all family gatherings with the new Rogers’, but it hadn’t lasted for long. Bucky had stopped aging the moment he turned 25, had served in every war the United States had been in since then, met hundreds if not thousands of different men and women and still nothing.

Brooding about this subject, Bucky lit the first cigarette of the day and enjoyed a long drag before washing it down with the lukewarm beer. His fridge didn’t work as well as he would like, but then again the last new refrigerator he had bought was in 1951. He knew that Steve would kill him if he found out that he was still smoking after all this time. Bucky couldn’t bring himself to care. In two more years he would be 100 years old and if smoking hadn’t killed him yet he didn’t think it was going to any time soon. 

Almost as if he knew Bucky was thinking dark thoughts, the familiar jingle of Steve’s ringtone sang out from where Bucky had plugged his phone in on the counter. With a sigh he got up and answered it.

“Morning, Buck! We still on for 11?”

“Yeah, Steve, of course,” Bucky said a little hoarsely. He needed to get a dog or something so he would have someone to talk to other than Steve. “I’m actually about to head out and pick up some things.”

“Are you sure you need to be going out? You’re supposed to be resting…”

“Steve, I’ve had the damn thing for months now. It’s fine.”

“Right.” Steve sounded doubtful and Bucky resisted the urge to scream at him. Somewhere along the way Steve had started treating  _ him  _ like the one who needed protecting all the time and not the other way around.                                                            

“I’ll see you in a few,” Bucky said and hung up before he really did say something he regretted. 

After a few more puffs on his cigarette Bucky snuffed it out in the empty tuna can he had been using as an ash tray and decided that now was as good a time as any to start cleaning up his apartment. Most of it was old take out boxes and discarded newspapers which he simply stuffed into a trash bag before putting out on the fire escape. Taking it to the actual garbage in his complex seemed like too much effort. He opened the three windows that his apartment boasted to try and get rid of at least some of the cigarette smoke and took out a can of Febreeze to take care of the rest. Feeling less like a piece of shit than when he woke up, Bucky pulled a shirt over his head and carefully threaded his left arm through the sleeve. He swapped the sweats out for a pair of dark jeans, grabbed his motorcycle jacket off the hook, steeled himself for the stares and odd looks his arm attracted, and headed out to get decent food for his two best friends.

***

“So does that thing like, go go gadget or something?”

Bucky was snapped out of his reverie of another cigarette and a can of beer at the checkout line in the grocery store by a sudden jerk in his stomach to find a guy wearing a shockingly purple shirt peering at his arm from under his sunglasses.  Bucky glared at him but didn’t respond. 

“Alright, hey,” the man said, lifting his hands in mock surrender. One held a two liter of grape soda, the other a bag of Cheetos. “It was just a question. No need to get all grumpy.” 

Bucky waited impatiently for the cashier to scan his items and hand him his change. The whole time he could feel the eyes of the other man practically boring into the metal of his left arm. He thanked the girl as she handed him his change, grabbed the paper bag containing the ingredients for his chili cheese casserole and tried not to think about how nice the other guy’s hair was. He left the store without looking back.

Brunch had gone better than usual. These days things were a little strained between Bucky and his friends. Peggy and Steve were well into their nineties and had been happily in love for over seventy years. Seventy years packed full of Bucky observing from the sidelines while his best friend got hitched to the love of his life and aged with her. Steve told him almost every day that ‘today is the day’ and he was going to meet his soulmate and finally grow old. One day Bucky snapped and punched Steve right in the jaw. The Berlin Wall went up that night. 

Bucky didn’t speak with Peggy or Steve until it fell. 

Today they just sort of chatted about the new painting that Steve was working on. He wouldn’t divulge any real details about it, just that it was going to be a surprise for Bucky. Peggy assured him that it wasn’t going to be anything inappropriate like the half-naked painting of Bucky’s army buddy Sam Wilson that Steve had bestowed upon Bucky for his birthday last year. Bucky still had no idea how Steve convinced Sam to pose for it when he was home from tour over Christmas, but the painting was one of Sam’s favorite things to bring up. Bucky kept it in the back of his closet. 

“It won’t be like that horror show from your birthday,” Peggy said, eyes dancing. She had reached across the table to place her wrinkled hand over Bucky’s metal one. “I promise.”

Bucky had laughed and tried to slide his hand off the table as casually as possible. “Alright, Peg. I’m counting on you to keep Steve from screwing up again.” Steve had been convinced that Sam was the one. But he misread the bonds forged on the battlefield for bonds that transferred into a soulmate. Bucky still didn’t look a day over 25 and neither did Sam. 

After a few more good natured laughs, Steve and Peggy said their goodbyes and made promises to be back over next Sunday if they didn’t see him before then. Steve didn’t even comment on the lingering scent of tobacco smoke before he clapped Bucky on the back and opened the door for Peggy. 

Bucky closed the door behind them and set about cleaning up from brunch. As always his chili cheese casserole was a big hit and there weren’t any leftovers. Realizing belatedly that he should have picked up more food for the rest of the week, Bucky decided that he would go back to the grocery store in the morning. In the meantime he decided he would head to the gym to test his arm’s ability to punch something. 

The frustration and loneliness that bubbled just below the surface always made an appearance directly after he saw Steve and Peggy. He had had many relationships over the years, men and women whose arms he could fall into at night and tumble with in the sheets but nothing ever lasted long. Eventually the other person realized that Bucky had nothing to give them. What kind of person wanted to stick around an angsty war veteran when he wasn’t their soulmate? Bucky filled the void in his life that only that special someone could fill by staying in the military and fighting in every conflict the United States was involved in. His body was riddled with scars going all the way back to the Second World War, but nothing quite topped his frustration at serving so long only to lose an arm somewhere in the middle of the godforsaken desert. 

At first, Bucky had thought that his soulmate had been killed during the first war. Millions of people had fallen victim to Hitler’s schemes that it seemed the best conclusion. But when Bucky failed to age so that he could still be with them at the end it became clear that he was mistaken. Turns out he’s one of those poor bastards who don’t have a soulmate, who go through life looking 25 years old until they die a violent death. But hey, what easier way to find a violent death than stumbling through the snow in Korea? Or slogging through the jungle in Vietnam? Fate, it seemed, was determined to torment Bucky Barnes and keep him 25 years old forever. 

Doing his best to pull himself out of his not so pleasant thoughts, Bucky stuffed boxing tape into his bag with a towel along with a change of clothes and headed out. Stark assured him that at this point his arms should be just fine with normal, everyday functions and it was. Bucky was taking the liberty of including punching with everyday functions. He gunned his Harley into life, a big, black, shiny beast, and sped off toward the gym to let off some steam. 

He changed in the locker room and made his way over to the punching bags. A man was already at it, pummeling a bag to within an inch of its dusty life. Bucky noted with mild surprise that the man appeared to be blind. Trying not to think about the humor of a blind man and a one armed man beating the piss out of punching bags, Bucky took his time getting ready. He watched two people spar in the ring while he taped his hands and was decently impressed. 

They both obviously had some sort of special training and even as he watched he was mildly surprised when the slighter of the two leapt and wrapped their legs around their opponent’s neck, flipping up with the movement and effectively throwing their opponent to the mat. He shook his head and smiled when he realized the slighter opponent was a woman. Her flaming red hair was pulled back in a tight bun and Bucky was nearly floored when he saw how attractive she was. He watched her put her hands on her hips and smile slightly before offering a hand to help her opponent off the mat. The blond man accepted it with a lot of good natured grumbling. He looked incredibly familiar but when Bucky took in the purple shirt he finally put his finger on it. Here was that obnoxious asshole who had tried to make a joke out of Bucky’s left arm. Bucky frowned at the sudden jerk in his stomach again and tried to ignore the way it sort of felt like a flutter. He turned his attention to his punching bag and was soon in his own little world that consisted of his fists, feet, and knees as he pummeled the heavy bag. 

_ Jab, cross, hook, double jab, cross, hook _ . He lost himself to the rhythm. A few minutes later he registered the feeling of someone watching him. With one last solid cross Bucky stopped and turned around to find the blond guy staring at him. 

“Can I help you?” Bucky huffed. It had been a long time since he had boxed but he was pleased with how his new arm had held up. The bandages still surrounding the seam were aggravating though. He rolled his shoulder to try and get the tightness out. 

“That arm can really take a beating, huh?” The guy said. Over his shoulder his sparring partner was actually in the process of squaring up for a round with the blind guy. Interesting.

“Yeah, I guess so.” Bucky turned his back and started making quick, tight jabs. Truthfully, his shoulder was starting to ache more than a little bit but he was determined to go as long as possible. His breath started to come quicker and he could feel the first hint of true strain pull at the muscles in his back.

“If you ever want to take it out for a spin,” the guy circled around so that Bucky could see him. “Just let me know,” he said with a wink. For two seconds Bucky’s brain short circuited. He froze mid punch and just stared at the guy as he walked away. “The name’s Clint,” he said without turning around, raising his arm in the air and waving it casually.

“Bucky,” Bucky’s mouth managed to get out while his brain shifted back in gear. Clint sat in one of the folding chairs scattered about the outside of the ring and watched as the redhead and the blind guy started their bout. Intrigued, Bucky halted his punching session and surveyed the opening throws of the match.

The blind man clearly knew what he was doing. He kept his fists raised in front of his face and he tilted his head slightly as if he was listening for the red head’s movements. She moved with the graceful fluidity of a dancer. Together their footwork would put a professional boxer to shame and Bucky was suddenly embarrassed by his own shuffling around. The two circled each other, aiming hits and blocking punches at a quick tempo. 

“C’mon, Matt! Sock her right in the jaw for me!” Clint called out to the blind guy. 

The red head’s mouth twitched up at the corners. “Thanks for that, Clint.” She leapt nimbly out of the way as Matt attempted a kick to the chest.

“Don’t worry Nat, it’s nothing personal.” 

“Yeah well, wait right there and when I’m done,” Nat landed a hit. “I’ll just kick your ass again.”

Bucky chuckled at the banter and wished for a fleeting moment that he could join in. Instead he turned back to his work out. 

It happened so fast that it took him completely by surprise. One minute, he was doing just fine punching the old leather bag and the next he felt a pain so sharp in his shoulder that he fell to his knees and cried out. He cradled the metal arm in his lap and when he tried moving the fingers nothing happened. Next he tried shrugging his shoulder and white hot pain made itself known. Bucky cursed in every language he knew. 

“Woah there, buddy. You okay?” Bucky heard Clint ask through the haze of pain that suddenly descended on his mind. “It’s Bucky, right?”

Bucky grit his teeth. “Looks like I should’ve taken it a little easier.” Nat and Matt had abandoned their sparring match and stood off to the side. Through the agony Bucky felt a combination of frustration, anger, and mortification. Five months ago he could have beaten the punching bag until his knuckles were bloody and he would’ve been just fine. Now he barely went at it for ten minutes and he felt like his shoulder was trying to kill him. He slid off his knees and sat on the floor, sucking in a breath through his teeth to help balance out the pain. 

“Is it your arm? Do you need an ambulance?” 

“Shit,” Bucky intoned. “No I’m…it’s fine. Just, just hand me my bag.” He pointed with his right hand to where he had thrown his bag before he started. Just the slight movement caused another jolt of pain. 

Steve was going to kill him. 

When Clint dropped his bag at his side Bucky didn’t waste any time searching for his cell. The sharp pains had been joined by a steady throb that he was pretty sure wasn’t a good sign. He quickly dialed Steve’s number. 

“You sure don’t look fine,” Clint said with a raised eyebrow. 

Bucky ignored him and laughed shakily when Peggy answered the phone. 

“Hey, Peg.”

_ “Bucky? What’s wrong? You sound awful. Did something happen?” _

“Uh, well you know what? Never mind. Everything’s fine, Peg.” Something about the immediate concern in Peggy’s voice made him change his mind about going to them for help. Peggy sounded like she had been waiting for something to go wrong and it made Bucky feel like he was a child. “Just tell Steve I’ve finally decided to quit smoking,” Bucky lied, saying the first thing that popped in his head through the pain. 

_ “Really? Oh that’s wonderful, Bucky. I’ll tell him right away. You take care now and we’ll see you next week!” _ Peggy hung up. 

Bucky closed his eyes and tried to ignore the way he was being stared at. There was nothing for it but to call Stark five days ahead of time for his weekly checkup. Stark was going to shit kittens when he found out that Bucky had decided to include boxing in his everyday activities. 

But since Stark was a bastard and never there when you actually needed him, he didn’t answer his phone. Bucky left a strained message, saying that Stark had better get his head out of his ass because he needed his help and ended the message with a nice bout of cursing. 

Then he remembered that he had driven his motorcycle to the gym. 

“Great,” Bucky muttered. “Riding one handed is going to be awesome.” He struggled to his feet, pushing down the wave of nausea that accompanied him. 

“‘Riding one handed?’ Wait you rode a bike here?” Clint wanted to know.

“Motorcycle.”

“Oh great, that’s just what we need on the streets, a one handed maniac driving a motorcycle,” Clint’s voice dripped sarcasm. Bucky heard Matt chuckle and he decided that he didn’t like him either.

“I’ll be fine,” Bucky practically snarled. His day was really taking an unpleasant turn. He should’ve known that the working arm was all too good to be true. He didn’t need this punk laughing at him to add to it.

“Bull shit,” Clint shot back. 

Bucky glared at him and Clint glared right back, grey eyes locked with blue. Bucky found himself wondering just how old the kid was. Because that’s what he looked like, a kid. There was something steely in his gaze but nothing that made him seem  _ old  _ the way Bucky was. He looked like a punk who had barely reached his first quarter century mark. 

“Let me give you a ride,” said Clint, still glaring. 

Bucky actually considered taking him up on that offer for all of ten seconds. Here was a new person to talk to who wasn’t Steve or Peggy. It would be stupid to ride his Harley back to his apartment, it really would be. And yet the stubborn soldier inside him insisted that he could ride home and be fine while doing it. He didn’t need help. 

“Thanks but no thanks.” Bucky shouldered his bag, put on his best ‘don’t fuck with me’ face and left the gym.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I just say WOW?? The response to this fic has been absolutely amazing! I'm glad to know that there are other people out there like me who love Winterhawk but I can't believe so many people have already left kudos and such positive responses to everything! You've inspired me to push up my time table on this update and get cracking on the rest of the story! Thank you all so much!

Clint watched Bucky stomp out of the gym, mouth slightly open. “Can you believe that guy?!” He asked Natasha and gestured at the closing door. 

Nat shrugged. “Some people don’t want help.” She gave him a meaningful look. 

“Okay, hey this is different. At least my troubles don’t endanger other people.”

“You should let us help, Clint,” Matt said softly. He carefully navigated his way back to where he had stashed his bag.

Clint snorted. “That’s rich, coming from you, Murdock. What about that time when you just about died when you saw how much law school was going to cost? You didn’t let us help you with that.”

“That was different. At least I don’t owe money to the mafia.”

“You make it sound so sketchy. I owe my  _ landlord  _ money. The fact that he may or may not be involved with the mafia is entirely coincidental.” Clint stuffed his towel in his bag with a little too much force and he heard the nylon tear. Great. Another thing he would have to spend money on.

“Just do me a favor,” Natasha said, retrieving her belongings as well. “Don’t make me have to fish you out of a dumpster one day.”

Clint laughed and waved her comment off, but later when he was letting himself back into his apartment and turning on the lights, the sinking feeling in his stomach grew more pronounced. Tasha and Matt were both right. He really needed to handle the situation before things got out of control. He thought about taking Lucky to stay with Matt and Tasha in case something happened to him but he knew that he would miss the dog too much. Sure enough as soon as he caught sight of that tail wagging most of Clint’s worries melted away and he spent the next ten minutes rolling on the floor with Lucky and giving him a belly rub. 

“What kind of name is ‘Bucky’?” Clint asked Lucky. Lucky licked his hand. “That’s a dumb name.”

He headed to the kitchen to rustle up something to eat but his thoughts kept returning to the man with the metal arm. How did he get it? And what kind of idiot decided to ride a motorcycle home when one arm was so far from working that it wasn’t even funny. He was so standoffish that Clint found him irresistibly intriguing.  The fact that he had that bad boy, drop dead gorgeous look working for him was completely irrelevant. Clint ended up just making himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and sat on the couch, still thinking about how weird the name Bucky was.

***

Looking back, Bucky had no idea how he made it back to his apartment without either killing himself or killing someone else. He kicked the door shut behind him and practically collapsed on his tired couch. He definitely did not notice the little puff of dust that rose from the cushions and he most definitely did not notice the way it sagged even closer to the floor. Maybe this week he would finally get around to visiting the thrift store for a new couch. Doubtful, but it could still theoretically happen. 

The pain in his shoulder had receded to a barely tolerable ache. He lit a cigarette and enjoyed a long drag. Even with the pain in his shoulder, Bucky’s thoughts kept drifting back to the guy from the gym. What was his problem? First he pointed out his arm at the supermarket and then again at the gym? Bucky very distinctly didn’t want to think about the concern he saw in the kid’s eyes when his shoulder first started acting up. Because that’s what he was, a kid.

Over the decades Bucky had gotten really good at pinpointing just how old someone was. Even though Unbonded still looked twenty five, they stopped acting like it. After a couple of decades of running amuck all over the place trying to find your soulmate unsuccessfully, your soul ages. It shows itself in the far off, sometimes cold gaze in the eyes and the way that color starts to leach out of all emotion until everything feels desolate and gray. Bucky had to think hard to remember the last time he had really laughed and it went all the way back to last Christmas when Steve had given him that disaster of a painting. Sam, around seventy years younger than Bucky had just about died from laughing while Steve, happily in his twilight years with his soulmate had laughed until there was a stitch in his side. Bucky not so much. Being alone for so long took the humor out of life.

Which was why Clint was definitely a kid. He still had that spark that was bright enough to be a sarcastic little shit and chuckle at his own jokes. Bucky had been like that once. But he had given up. So why was he still thinking about him?

Bucky finished his cigarette and lit another one just as there was a knock on his door.

“Fuck off!” Bucky called at the door.

“Oh, good! You’re not dead!”

Tony Stark was at his door.

_Shit._

“Fuck off!” Bucky repeated, this time with more force. He was definitely not in the mood. Yes, he had been the one to call Stark, yes he should really open the door so that Stark could take a peek at his arm, but now that he was home all Bucky wanted to do was smoke in peace and maybe nap a little. And shower. None of that required Stark’s help.

“Hey, I don’t have to be here you know!” Stark said loudly, voice sounding slightly muffled through the door. “I took time out of my busy, busy schedule to haul your ass out of trouble.”

If he had any other option, Bucky would’ve taken it. Really. It wasn’t that he hated Stark it was that…yeah he hated Stark. The guy was loud and obnoxious, always seemed to smell like whiskey, and never seemed to take anything seriously. He honestly had no idea how Steve had ended up such good friends with the guy over the course of the trial but they had dinner every week. Bucky hated it. But he was the only option if he was going to have a functioning arm.

Holding the memory of his functioning arm from just that morning in his mind, Bucky grit his teeth and managed to open the door without passing out or punching Stark directly in the face.

“Barnes!” Stark clapped him on the good shoulder and entered. He had a heavy looking duffle bag slung over one shoulder and carried a cup of coffee in one hand. “What’ve you done with my tech?”

“Nothing. Your tech just didn’t want to hold up.”

“Now that’s wrong and you know it. You must’ve done something. Come on, what was it?” Stark spoke very quickly and set the duffle bag on the floor with a solid, metallic thud. “I said it was only cleared for everyday activities.”

Bucky motioned for Stark to sit down and immediately regretted it when the pain in his shoulder spiked again. “I may have taken it to the gym,” he said quietly. Best to get everything out in the open so Stark could fix the damn thing and then be gone.

“And what did you do at the gym? Lift a car?” Stark sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to him. Once again a puff of dust escaped from the cushions and Bucky had to hold back an embarrassed wince. He sat and Stark began a cursory examination. He clicked his tongue and began fishing tools out of his bag.

“Boxing.” Might as well be honest.

“Boxing?”

“Boxing.”

Stark stared at him. “Damn Barnes, you must box like you’re trying to kill something.”

Bucky shrugged with his one good shoulder. “It’s been a while.”

Stark rolled his eyes and resumed his examination.

“You know,” he said, straightening some of the wiring deep within the metal arm, “you should come by my place sometime. Every week Pepper and I have friends over for cards. You’d like it. Half of us are cheerful bastards just like you and the other half are horrible cheaters. Friday night. You busy?”

Sam was coming home from Iraq Friday. He’d sent Bucky a message that he would be in New York. “I’ve got a friend coming in,” Bucky said, wincing as the feeling returned to his metal fingers. Pressure and temperature sensors worked together throughout the metal plating to create a rudimentary feeling of touch and the sensation of them reconnecting and coming back online was akin to the tingles of blood flow returning when he slept on his flesh arm funny. Needless to say, it was not a pleasant experience. 

“So bring your friend.” Stark brandished his screwdriver at him. “We love meeting new people.” He finished whatever it was he was working on in the inside of the arm and moved his attention to the outside, inspecting the metal plates as he moved the appendage around. “Your old man plays with us too.”

“Steve?”

“That’s the one.” Stark threw one of his tools back into his bag.

Bucky snorted. “Yeah, he’s not my old man. He’s a friend.”

“Same thing,” Stark said, waving a hand in dismissal. He threw the rest of the tools back into the bag and held up a stern finger. “No more boxing for a week. This is still a prototype so there will probably be more ironing out that we need to do later. I’ll take the bandages off for good on Friday.” He pulled a greasy receipt out of his bag and scribbled an address on it with a pen he pulled from his pocket. “Friday,” he said, thrusting the receipt at him. “Be there and bring your friend.” He waltzed out of the room, calling out “No boxing!” again just before he shut the door.  

Bucky exhaled loudly and stared at the door. Cards. He could totally do cards. Yeah...totally. 

He couldn’t wait until Sam showed up.

***

Bucky jackknifed off the couch with a scream, gripped by terror from a dream swirling with napalm and mud so thick it could pull a man down and drown him and people screaming and screaming and screaming--his stomach lurched and he shot into the bathroom, making it to the toilet just in time before he threw up. His body whole body shook and he struggled to focus on the cool tile beneath him. His mind refused to let go of the image of napalm engulfing bodies, melting their flesh right off of bone and the jungle on fire, the concussive blasts from the airstrikes shaking the ground beneath his boots.

It had been a while since he had dreamt of Vietnam. 

He counted to ten slowly in his head and forced his breathing to even out. After a few more seconds he climbed to his feet and flushed the toilet. A few more seconds of leaning against the wall and then he stumbled over to the sink and rinsed the taste of war and vomit from his mouth. Bucky splashed the cool water over his face and the back of his neck and stared at his reflection. He looked the same way he always had for the past seventy years except--his eyes narrowed as he focused harder. Were those new lines around his mouth? 

He stared at himself in the mirror and decided that no, just needed to sleep more and somewhere that wasn’t the couch. 

A glance at his phone showed a missed call from Sam. He muttered a curse and called him back to find that Sam was on a bus headed into the city and that, if Bucky could come and pick his ass up from Grand Central that would be spectacular.

“Only if you don’t mind riding on the back of my motorcycle,” Bucky teased. 

Sam laughed on the other end of the line. “I got no problems with that as long as we get food somewhere.”  

“You got it.” 

Bucky ended up getting to the station before Sam’s bus pulled up but he didn’t mind waiting. He always enjoyed people watching and New York City never failed to put on a good show. It helped take his mind off of his excitement at seeing his old friend again and nerves at the thought of dragging him to an event hosted by Stark. He could only hope that Sam wouldn’t take one look at the eccentric billionaire and launch himself out of the nearest window. To be perfectly honest, Bucky would be just one step behind him. 

“Hey, Bucky!” 

Bucky turned at the sound of his name and there was Sam Wilson, wearing aviators and a leather jacket that nearly rivaled Bucky’s in terms of mileage. He waved and picked up the duffel bag at his feet and shoved his way through the throngs of people. There was an awkward moment where they both just sort of stared at each other before Sam laughed happily and clapped Bucky on the back in a warm embrace. Bucky chuckled with him and returned the gesture. And just like that, they fell back into the easy camaraderie that had always existed between the two of them.

“How’s the arm?” Sam asked, giving Bucky’s left shoulder a hard poke. 

“Still attached so I guess that’s a good thing,” Bucky joked. His spirits always lifted around Sam in the same way that they used to around Steve before the bitterness had crept in. Bucky neglected to mention the boxing incident two days previously, but whatever Stark had done had done the trick and the arm was working just fine. 

“You gotta show it to me later because I still don’t believe you that the whole thing is metal.”

Bucky shrugged. “Alright, but I won’t catch you when you faint like a little princess.” He led the way out of the station to where he had parked his bike. 

“Oh, a princess is it?” 

“Yup.” 

They grabbed lunch at a tiny pizzeria with a cute waitress who flirted with Sam but carefully avoided Bucky’s gaze. Bucky was just thinking that maybe he should have shaved and done something to fix the tangled rat’s nest that was his hair when Sam cleared his throat.

“What?” Bucky snapped out of his thoughts of trying to fix his hair in such a way that it traveled well with a motorcycle. 

“I asked what our plans were for the weekend.” Sam took a sip of the Coca-Cola he was drinking and raised an eyebrow. “I mean, I guess I would be fine with catching up with whatever reality tv craze I missed while I was over there but I wouldn’t say no to a little partying around town somewhere.”

Bucky huffed out a sigh, feigning irritation. “Okay, now look. I don’t want any repeats of what happened the last time you were here. I still can’t show my face in there without someone wanting to break my nose.”

His friend laughed and raised his hands in mock surrender. “Hey, how was I supposed to know that the bouncer was her brother? And you know that I legitimately tripped. I didn’t do it on purpose.” 

Bucky chuckled as he thought back to the night that Sam had tripped over a barstool and face planted straight into the bosom of the bouncer’s sister at a nightclub. In the chaos that immediately followed Bucky had broken someone’s collarbone and Sam had bruised the bones in his hand. 

“Good times.”

“Yeah,” Sam sighed. “So what are we doing?” He quirked an eyebrow 

“Okay so tonight,” Bucky ran a hand nervously through his hair, wincing slightly at the knots. It really was getting long. “My...friend is having kind of like a card night with a bunch of other people and he’s forcing me to go so I’m forcing you to go with me.” He ended everything in a rush and did his best not to flush when Sam gave him a flat stare.

“Card night?” He said with another raised brow. “What are you, 80?” 

Bucky laughed but inside he felt hollow. He had never told Sam just how old he was, ashamed at the way that he was broken. Here he was, practically a hundred year old man, with no one. As far as Sam knew, Bucky had just turned 25. 

“Did I mention that the guy having the card night is a billionaire?” Bucky said, to carry the conversation into more comfortable waters. He ignored the hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach and picked up his last slice of pizza to give his hands something to do.

Sam choked on his drink. “What?!”

Bucky said around a mouthful of pizza, “Yeah, it’s Tony Stark.”

Sam whistled and raised his glass in a toast. “To Mr. Stark’s then!”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this update took a while to produce. I had a death in the family, got a new job, and my sister got married. So it was A LOT. I'm going to be moving soon so I don't know when I'll be able to post the next chapter but I continue to be just completely floored by how many people have left kudos on this fic! I'm glad we're all here reading Winterhawk fic together <3

A couple of hours later Bucky grudgingly changed into jeans and a blue button down at the request of Sam. (“Dude, you can’t go to a billionaire’s place looking like shit. And comb your hair!”) Instead of combing his hair like his friend had requested, Bucky threw it up in a bun with a very pained sigh. Sam huffed in annoyance but conceded the point. For his part, Sam was wearing a maroon button down and a pair of slacks and exuded an excitement that Bucky did not share. 

“I wonder if there are going to be models there,” Sam said wistfully. 

“Only one way to find out,” Bucky mumbled, waiting for his friend to walk through the open door so he could lock up his apartment. He tucked the six pack Sam had bullied him into buying into the crook of his arm and slid the key home. 

“You sound so happy,” replied Sam sarcastically. “You do realize that you’re the one who invited me to go to this thing with you. Even if it is a card night, it’s a card night  _ at a billionaire’s place _ ,” Sam spread his hands wide and wiggled his fingers for emphasis. Bucky granted him a chuckle that had the other man slapping his back. “So throw on a smile and let’s go see how much money we can swindle Tony Stark out of.”

Privately, Bucky very much doubted that Sam would be able so swindle Stark out of any money. Something told him that Tony Stark was very good at holding onto his cash and making more. 

***

“Shit, this is the place?” Sam whistled.

“Yup.” Bucky stuffed his hands in his pockets and craned his neck, trying to see the top of the skyscraper towering in front of him. “I’ve got no idea where he got all of it.”

“I knew he was loaded, but this,” he shook his head in disbelief. “This is insane. We are so out of place here.”

They pushed through the large spinning door and entered a spacious lobby with marble floors. A single security desk stood sentinel in the center of the lobby. A quick once over showed that the guard was more than just for show. Bucky noted two likely places for a weapon and something in him automatically tensed. The floral arrangements larger than his closet of a bathroom between the two elevators did nothing to ease his anxiety. Sam whistled again.

“I think that’s going to be the theme of the evening,” Bucky grumbled. Sam’s presence made him slightly more comfortable. He had that effect on people. Bucky forced himself to square his shoulders and take a deep breath. He had been part of the landing at Inch’ŏn in ‘50. He could go to a god damned card night.  

The doors to the closest elevator slid open, casting a soft light across the floor. The two friends looked at each other and shrugged. 

“Going up?” said Sam. Bucky snorted and entered the lift first. The eyes of the security guard followed him all the way across the lobby. He nearly jumped out of his skin when a disembodied voice welcomed him. 

“Hello, Sergeant Barnes. Mister Stark will be so pleased that you could make it.”

Bucky stiffly said, “Right,” and Sam snickered, following him into the elevator. The doors closed behind him and they started moving. 

“The rest of the guests have already arrived and the game is in full swing,” the voice helpfully informed them. Bucky had a mental picture of Steve seated at a table clutching playing cards with a calm Tony Stark speaking about the week’s farmers market and for some reason the image didn’t seem to fit. The doors dinged open and they found themselves in the middle of a sleek modern living room in the midst of what looked like a war zone. 

A slight haze hung over the room and adrenaline started pumping through Bucky’s veins. He traced the source of the smoke to a used fire extinguisher lying discarded next to an overturned couch. A beautiful redhead was perched on the couch with a beer bottle in one hand and three cards in the other. On the other side of the room, Steve was laughing hysterically as Tony Stark hopped around on one foot, swearing fluently as he swapped cards with Steve, a dog happily doing circles around the two. Empty beer bottles littered the floor and a man with glasses barely dangling off of the bridge of his nose was balanced precariously on the arm of a squishy looking armchair, sipping happily from a brown bottle. Loud music blared from a source Bucky couldn’t identify and as they stepped out of the elevator in shock, someone else came in from the kitchen. He crashed into Bucky and sent the bowl of popcorn flying into the air. In the blink of an eye, Bucky had the individual in a choke hold. Everyone’s heads snapped around when the bowl clanged to the floor and the dog came over barking. 

“Clint, did you drop my popcorn?” Another voice came from the kitchen. 

The man--Clint struggled against his chokehold but Bucky held fast. They were under attack and now was no time to show mercy and if they weren’t careful then--

Wait. Clint. Of course the annoying hot guy from the gym would be at Stark’s party. Bucky’s luck was just that good that literally everyone he knew already knew each other and he was the last to catch up. 

Slightly dizzy as the adrenaline abruptly left his system, Bucky loosened his grip and did his best to figure out what in the hell was going on. Clint scrambled back from him. 

After an awkward moment when Bucky found he didn’t have any words to say and just stood there blinking in confusion, Steve came to the rescue by noticing Sam. 

“Wilson! Good to see you!” 

“ Uh, yeah.” Sam said. He sounded concerned but Bucky was too busy staring at Clint to really care. Clint stared right back at him and Bucky watched as the color heightened in his cheeks. “You too, Steve.” Sam said somewhere next to him. “Wow. This is some card game you’ve got going on. You do realize you’re like a hundred, right?”

Steve waved a hand, laughing it off. “I’m 100. I’m not dead.”

Bucky tore his gaze away from Clint and registered that the redhead was Natasha from the gym and then Matt walked in from the kitchen, a frown on his face and holding two beer bottles. “I knew I should’ve carried that instead of the beer,” he said.  

“Is this...how you guys play cards?” Bucky gestured weakly at the mess in front of him. 

“Hey,” said Tony. “I don’t judge you for your life, why do you have to judge mine?” Sam laughed but Bucky scowled. Before he got the chance to respond the dog sat down in front of him, wagged his tail, and began to whine. It only had one eye and Bucky’s heart melted.

He knelt down and started petting the dog which got more and more excited and before he knew it, he was laying flat out on the floor with the dog licking his face. Bucky was vaguely aware of Sam shaking hands with everyone in the room and introductions being made but he was far too busy with the dog to pay close attention. A rise in volume told him that the card game had probably started again. At some point he sat up and pulled the fully grown dog onto his lap so he could bury his face in the fur. 

Dogs were the greatest things on the face of the planet.

“I’m glad you like my dog,” a voice said off to the left.

Bucky looked up just as the dog flopped out of his lap to stretch out next to him with his back pressed up against Bucky’s side. Clint was sitting on the ground next to them with a small smile.

“His name’s Lucky,” he said and took a sip of the beer he was holding. The popcorn was still scattered across the floor and added to the general chaos of the room. 

“Hey, Lucky,” Bucky said to the dog whose ears perked up at the mention of his name. 

“Rescued him from my crazy neighbors.” Clint reached forward and scratched his dog behind the ears. “I fed him pizza so I call him Pizza Dog sometimes too. He answers to both.”

Bucky chuckled at the idea of Clint feeding a dog pizza. Of course he would. But he had clearly won the affection of the fury beast laying beside him. 

“Can I get you a beer?” asked Clint. 

Bucky appraised the man sitting next to him with his disheveled blond hair and purple button down. The color certainly suited him. He nodded and Clint leapt up with a level of finesse that Bucky found slightly impossible to believe and disappeared into the kitchen. Bucky continued to absentmindedly pet Lucky next to him as he tried to figure out the rules to the ridiculous card game that Sam had been roped into playing. There was something about the floor being lava (maybe that explained the empty fire extinguisher?) in addition to some sort of team element that Bucky couldn’t fathom. It looked impossibly complicated and he was much happier watching and petting a dog than playing himself. 

Clint returned with two more beers and a bowl of potato chips and resumed his seat next to Bucky but this time he sat a little closer. “Your buddy Sam looks like he’s having a good time,” he said as he passed Bucky a beer. Sam was in the process of jumping up and down and trading cards with Steve who was doing remarkably well seeing as he was older than everyone else in the room. Everyone else but Bucky that was.

“Sam loves meeting new people,” Bucky said taking a sip. He didn’t recognize the label but it tasted fine. They were clearly playing the ‘let’s-ignore-the-fact-I-almost-choked-you-out’ game and Bucky was all for it.

Clint studied the bowl and began taking out only the biggest chips. “He seems like a good guy to have around.” Bucky grunted in agreement and silence fell between the pair. “You don’t talk much, do you?” Clint asked.

Bucky shrugged. “I don’t got a lot to say.” Now that was a lie. He had plenty of things to say but just didn’t usually have anyone to say them to. He didn’t want to bother Steve or Peggy now that they were so old and Sam had his own life. Bucky was dying to talk about InSight landing on Mars but he didn’t have anyone to discuss it with. And by discuss he meant a lot of excited yelling. 

“That’s alright. I’ve got enough to say for the both of us.” And suddenly Bucky found himself getting drawn into the sound of Clint’s voice as he just started talking about seemingly whatever popped into his head. One minute, he was complaining about the lack of hours he was getting at the gym (“Yeah, yeah shut up. I’m a gymnast.”) and the next he was describing how disappointed he was when he left the theater after  _ Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them _ . “You just don’t mess with something that was perfect already. Why tease us with more magic if you’re not going to take us back to Hogwarts?” 

“So you’re a purist, huh?”

“Now, don’t get me wrong. JJ Abrams did a beautiful job with the  _ Star Trek _ reboot but J.K. Rowling should’ve left her own stuff alone.”

“You are not ready to hear about the new  _ Star Wars  _ movies.”

“Now that, Sugar,” Clint said, with a swig of beer, “is where you’re wrong.”

Bucky had thought that he and Steve were excited about the new films. If they were excited, Clint was completely over the moon, about to shit kittens excited. His grey eyes shined as he outlined all of his hopes and dreams for the one, theories and ascertations flew faster and faster, and soon Bucky found himself joining in until they were practically shouting at each other and Lucky got up to find somewhere quieter and filled with fewer flailing arms to lay down. The background party noise faded away as Bucky got more engrossed in the conversation and he hardly noticed the dog leave. 

“Well hey, looks like you are having quite the party over here. Do you start all of your conversations with a little ,” Natasha’s voice halted their conversation midstream. 

“Turns out my new friend here is a much bigger dork than he would have you believe.” 

Bucky felt himself flush when Natasha laughed. “Don’t worry, Tiger. I just finished another  _ Star Wars _ marathon with Matt.

“We’re all going to watch them together soon,” Clint announced happily and chugged the last of his beer. 

“We are?” Bucky said.

Clint’s smile in response was so genuine that Bucky had to look away. Warmth crept into his chest in a way that he hadn’t felt in years, but this time it was different and he didn’t know how to react. Luckily Steve chose that moment to come and check up on him. 

“I’m glad you came out tonight,” he said, beaming down at Bucky and Clint sitting on the floor next to one another. “When Stark told me that you were supposed to show I didn’t believe him at first.”

Slightly affronted, Bucky responded flatly, “Guess I’m still full of surprises.” 

Steve frowned at him but Sam sailed in just in time to prevent an argument from developing. 

The  night passed quickly after that and for the first time in a while, Bucky found himself wishing for a night to pass more slowly. The warm feeling stayed put just under his breastbone and grew whenever Clint smiled at him or made a point of including him in the conversation. Lucky seemed to have imprinted on him and followed Bucky wherever he moved around the spacious tower. Steve ducked out around eleven, Peggy having arrived to pick him up. He slapped Bucky on the back on his way out, a gleam in his eye as he glanced knowingly between Bucky and Clint, the latter with his legs draped across Bucky’s lap as he drawled on about the different kinds of pizza he and Lucky enjoyed most.  

It soon became clear however, that Sam had had one too many beers and needed to be taken home. He was flirting expansively with Natasha who was surveying him with a raised eyebrow and amusement. Bucky intervened before anything too disastrous could happen and steered Sam toward the door. He shoved Sam into the elevator and turned to thank Tony for inviting them but Stark was nowhere to be found. Instead he made eye contact with Clint and was suddenly hyper aware of everything in the room. Bucky found himself wondering whether or not the blond had noticed that Bucky had spilled a bit of beer on his shirt. He struggled to keep his face impassive. 

“We should definitely hang out sometime,” Clint said in such a nonchalant way that Bucky kind of wanted to punch him in the face. How could the guy be so calm? A few hours ago Bucky had him in a headlock and now...he could almost be asking him out on a date. 

But people didn’t ask Bucky out on dates. 

Bucky managed to school his facial features into a small smile and said something along the lines of “Yeah, definitely,” before he blindly hit the button to close the elevator doors. The last thing he saw was Clint raise an eyebrow before the doors shut and the elevator started its way down to the lobby. 

He let out a heavy sigh and slumped slightly against the wall, mentally exhausted after the night. As soon as he and Sam stepped out onto the street, he lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. Sam wobbled slightly next to him as they made their way to the nearest subway station. 

“So, you and that guy, huh?” Sam slurred slightly. 

Bucky shrugged his shoulders, unwilling to comment on something that may or may not happen. He definitely felt something when he was around the other man, but there was no telling how Clint felt. 

It wasn’t until much later that Bucky realized that he had no way of contacting Clint, even if he wanted to. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This scene is essentially my take on True American from New Girl if any of you have seen that show lol I thought it would be hilarious to see the Avengers doing something similar. I think a friend of mine asked me to write a scene like this ages ago and here it finally is!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this took so long to update! My creativity in this story sort of ground to a halt, but I'm already like 500 words into the next chapter so it won't be so long between updates again! And I know where I want this fic to go, the only problem is...you know...writing it out so that it gets there lol thanks for reading!

Clint was so fucked. In fact, he was so very fucked that he didn’t want to think about how fucked he was. Except the reason why he was so fucked insisted on pounding loudly on his door. 

“We know you’re in there, you bastard! We want our money!” the voice called for the second time. 

At least Clint thought it was the second time. He’d fallen asleep on the couch while eating pizza, an ability that Natasha never ceased to harp on him about, and only recently been woken up by Lucky sticking his nose directly in his face. Presently Lucky’s tail was wagging nervously and he sat by the window.

“Great idea, dog,” Clint said, grabbing a bag and hurriedly stuffed it with clothes. He didn’t have anything else worth taking—it was just him and the dog. “Let’s take the fire escape down.” Ignoring the increasingly loud banging on his door, Clint opened the window and climbed out. Lucky leapt out onto the fire escape after him. 

Clint didn’t really understand why they were so mad. Okay, maybe he owed rent for the past two, maybe three months but that was nothing to get upset about. It also might have something to do with the fact that the guy he actually owed rent to just so happened to be the head of his building’s very own tracksuit mafia. They didn’t like how Clint didn’t take them seriously and the fact that he owed them so much money. Or it could be that their dog loved him more than them, was won over with copious amounts of pizza and was currently sitting in Clint’s apartment giving him a look with his one remaining eye that clearly said “We gotta get the hell out of Dodge.”

Clint slipped the pack on and apologized to Lucky before scooping the dog up and draping him across his shoulders. The one eyed dog held up like a champ, licking Clint’s ear as he navigated his way down the ladder three floors to the alley below. 

Unfortunately the tracksuit mafia had similar ideas. 

Four guys waited for Clint at the base of the fire escape. Two had baseball bats while the others sported wicked looking knives.

“Aw c’mon, guys! I’ve got a dog,” Clint gestured at Lucky who chose that moment to scramble gracelessly off Clint’s back. 

“The boss wants his money, and we ain’t going anywhere until you give it to us,” One of the guys holding a baseball bat declared. His hair was greasier than the pizza Clint had just been eating. Clint immediately dubbed him Greasy. The four men moved closer. Lucky growled. 

Clint took a deep breath and took stock of the situation. Two guys he could take down easy, particularly Greasy and his fellow bat wielding friend Clint aptly named Batty. The other two with the knives would be a little more difficult but nothing he couldn’t handle as long as Lucky stayed out of the way.

“Hey, why don’t we take a minute to talk about this first?” Clint said, rubbing the back of his head. “I don’t want to give you guys any trouble, honest.” 

Batty snorted. “He don’t got the money. He’s trying to stall.” 

Clint covered his heart, feigning hurt. “Now that’s just grossly unfair. I do have the money it’s just—“ Something heavy cracked down on his head then that brought Clint to his knees. “Sonovabitch,” he swore and twisted around to stare blearily at his attacker. A fifth man had crept up behind him and was holding a crowbar, now dripping slightly with blood. 

“We’ll show you what happens when you try and weasel your way out.”

Before the man could swing the crowbar again Clint leapt into action. He swept his leg around, knocking the man off of his feet and jumped and brought his fists up in front of his face before the other mobsters could react. He barely registered Lucky running off before Greasy snarled and swung his bat. Clint ducked, weaving in to punch him in the throat, dropping him. He ignored the growing pain in the back of his head as he turned his sights on his remaining adversaries. The one with the crowbar had regained his balance and looked furious. Clint dodged a slash of a knife and rolled unceremoniously into some trash cans. He popped back up quickly enough though, holding the lid of one to ward off more knife attacks. Unfortunately, since Clint’s luck had literally just run off, his head wound decided it wasn’t getting enough attention and took that moment to rack up the pain a few notches. Clint started to sway on the spot and wasn’t quite quick enough to avoid his next encounter with the crowbar. It hit him in the side and Clint was 98% sure he felt some ribs break. He cried out and fell on his side and the mobsters took full advantage of his plight. One hacked down with a knife while the others kicked. Clint felt a white hot pain somewhere in the vicinity of his abdomen right before a boot collided with his skull and everything went black. 

***

Bucky lit another cigarette and tried to ignore the slight guilt that cropped up when he thought of Peggy’s disappointed face. Yeah, he knew he shouldn’t really be smoking but hey, if it wasn’t going to kill him, what was the harm? 

Sam was apartment hunting with Steve and Peggy. He had decided that New York might be a good place to stay, at least for a little while and Bucky was glad to have him close. He could pretend that Sam wanted a change of pace and that was why he was relocating, not because he wanted to keep an eye on him. Stark still came by once a week to check in on him and his arm, and everything was just going hunkydorey. Except for the swooping sensation he had felt in his stomach when he had seen Clint at the gym twice. Bucky was trying very hard to ignore the possibilities that went along with that feeling because he didn’t want to get his hopes up. The odds that he would finally find his match after all this time were fleeting. He scowled heavily and took another drag from his cigarette. 

A dog trotted out of the alley to his right and whined at him. 

“Lucky?”

The one eyed dog sniffed his outstretched hand before licking his knuckles. Before Bucky could give him a scratch behind the ears though, Lucky yipped and ran back into the alley, stopping a few feet away and wagging his tail. 

“Everything okay, buddy?” Bucky looked around the alley seeing nothing but a dumpster and some leaking trash bags. “Where’s Clint?” He didn’t think Clint was the kind of guy to just let his dog run around by itself.

At the mention of Clint’s name, Lucky whined and went to sit by the dumpster, scratching at it. 

With a sinking feeling, Bucky looked into the dumpster and swore colorfully. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed 9-1-1. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy! As always, I don't have a beta so any mistakes in this are mine!

Bucky was currently squashed into an uncomfortable hospital chair in the waiting room. The thing seemed to be mostly plastic and designed to keep its occupants as miserable as possible so no one fell asleep and inconvenienced the staff. Lucky, the bastard, was currently snoring at his feet. He’d given the receptionist a nice long, bullshit story that he was his service dog. Having a metal arm works wonders if you use the right angle.

At first, the EMTs had thought that Bucky was the reason Clint had ended up in the dumpster and after a few tense moments where he was certain he was going to get arrested, his protestations and Lucky’s big brown eyes finally convinced them that he wasn’t responsible. It was a good enough argument to get a haircut and maybe trim his beard a bit if the EMTs were convinced that he was a hobo who had tried to rob Clint for drug money. And then the cops showed up. So, after ensuring them that yes, he would answer their questions at the hospital and yes, he was a friend of Clint’s (acquaintances totally counted in situations where you fished the other person’s mostly unconscious body out of a dumpster), Bucky was released to follow the ambulance on his bike to the hospital. He’d given his statement once the hospital staff had wheeled Clint off to go get some tests done or whatever it was that happened in hospitals, and Bucky had been sitting alone in the waiting room ever since. 

For a while, he contented himself with watching the other people coming and going, receiving bad news and good, and comforting one another. Bucky witnessed no less than two fist fights break out; New York was nice that way. After watching a rather tearful break up, Bucky started to rethink his decision to stay. He’d done his job already, right? He had called an ambulance, seen Clint safely checked into the hospital, and given his statement to the cops. Surely he wasn’t expected to sit around all night waiting for the doctors to let him know if Clint’s gut wound was fatal or not. (He doubted it. He had seen  _ a lot  _ of gut wounds in his time and he didn’t think that this one was deep enough to be that nasty. But the garbage could definitely make infection set in faster so there was that to worry about. He tried not to think about what sort of nasty soup formed at the bottom of dumpsters.) The hospital had probably called whoever was listed as Clint’s emergency contact and that person would be here soon and they could take over sitting in this shitty seat, worrying. When it came down to it, he didn’t even know Clint. They’d only spoken a few times. 

But each time a funny feeling had crept up into his chest to settle just beneath his breast bone, warm and soft. In the hundred or so years that he had been walking this planet, nothing had ever felt quite like talking to Clint. Bucky was seriously deluding himself if he said he didn’t want to experience it over and over. Just thinking about that warm feeling made him relax. And then the guilt crept back in that he was sitting here, relaxing when Clint was getting stitched back together, but then thinking about the kid would make him feel calm (and safe?) enough just in time to feel guilty about it again, and on and on it went like an infinite feedback loop. 

So he stayed.  

His back was starting to complain from the angle he had himself stuffed in the chair, and he didn’t think that smoking was allowed in hospitals anymore, so he got up to get a cup of coffee. Lucky’s head popped up when Bucky stood up, and the dog watched him walk all the way to the cheap hospital coffee machine and kept watching him while he fixed it the way he liked it, with way too much cream and never enough sugar. When he made his way back to his seat, Lucky’s tail gave a little half-hearted wag, thumping softly against the floor. He reached down and scratched him behind the ears.

“I don’t know how much longer we’re gonna have to wait, buddy,” he said and took a sip from the styrofoam cup. Even with all of the sugar he had dumped in it, the coffee still tasted like shit. He slumped back in his chair with a sigh. A flash of color near the entrance caught his eye and he turned to see Natasha striding into the waiting room with Matt just behind her. At first glance she looked perfectly calm and collected, her fiery red hair up in a tight bun with a few delicate strands framing her face and impeccable eyeliner, but he saw the slight creases in the corner of her eyes and  the way she clutched tightly to Matt’s hand. Matt’s brow was furrowed Bucky fully expected them to walk right by him and maybe claim seats at the other end of the room, but he definitely didn’t expect Natasha to walk right up to him, bend down to get into his face, and grab his chin so that their noses were just inches apart and snarl, “What. Happened.” at him. 

Bucky blinked up at her. “Uh,” he said eloquently. Her eyes were really, really green and she looked really, really pissed now. 

“What happened?” she repeated, quieter this time but no less intense. Behind her, Matt crouched down to greet Lucky.

“I don’t really know,” Bucky said honestly. “But I found him in a dumpster.” 

Natasha swore in a language that he was pretty sure was Russian. Or maybe Lithuanian. It had been a while since he’d needed to use either of those languages. 

“How did you even know we were here?” he asked her.

“I’m his emergency contact.” She sat in the chair on his right and Matt took the one next to her. Lucky sat up to put his head in Natasha’s lap and started whining softly. “I know, Lucky,” she said softly, and started to pet him. Bucky noted her fingers trembling. “Me too.” 

They sat in uncomfortable silence for a time, Bucky growing increasingly jumpy. His trigger finger kept twitching and when an old man near the coffee machine scraped his chair across the floor, Bucky nearly knocked himself to the floor with the force of his flinch. Coffee had definitely been a mistake. The last time he had been in a hospital hadn’t exactly been a walk in the park. He’d gone from blown up on the side of a dusty, desert road with Sam yelling at him to stay awake, to a shitty army triage tent, before finally ending up back in the States one arm short. At the VA hospital, the doctors hadn’t believed his paperwork at first. Surely, his birthdate was incorrect? Was he absolutely certain that his D.O.B. was printed correctly on his enlistment papers? And then finally, the inevitable: what was it like?

Bucky hated doctors.

The door swung open and a doctor with a clipboard in his hand walked into the room. Someone must have told him about who had brought Clint in because Bucky watched him look at his arm and then at Lucky sitting near him before making his way over to their group. The three of them got to their feet.

“Are you the guy who brought in Clinton?” He asked Bucky. 

If they weren’t in a hospital waiting room, he definitely would’ve laughed at the name. Clinton? Yikes. “Yeah, that’s me. And she’s his emergency contact,” he said, pointing a thumb over his shoulder at Natasha. 

“What are we looking like, Doc?” asked Natasha. 

He sighed. “It definitely could have been worse, but it’s not good. He’s got a pretty nasty concussion and some broken ribs. But the thing that had us really worried was the stab wound.” There was a sharp intake of breath next to Bucky from Natasha and Matt swore. “Any deeper and Clinton would have been in some serious trouble. As it is, we’re going to keep him under observation for a few days but so long as there’s no infection he should be good to go home.”

“So he’s going to be okay?” Matt asked.

The doctor smiled, a small tired thing, but a smile nonetheless. “He’ll be okay.” 

Bucky breathed a sigh of relief and sat back down in his chair. Clint would be okay. He brought a shaking hand up to his forehead and took a deep breath. Something in his chest relaxed for the first time since he had seen Clint bleeding in that dumpster. There was some movement near him and the shuffling of feet and when Bucky looked up next, he was alone in the waiting room again. Even Lucky was gone.

Oh.

He didn’t know why he felt so surprised. It’s not like he really knew these people; he’d just met them in passing at the gym, and then once again at Stark’s place. Of course they would want some privacy once they knew that Clint was going to be okay. 

These people weren’t his friends, they didn’t know him. 

It was time to go. 

When he stood up, his back popped and his shoulder complained. Each one of his old aches and pains had apparently decided to themselves known. He felt pathetic. Pulling Clint out of the dumpster hadn’t exactly been easy, and Stark would probably lose his shit if he knew that Bucky was already doing more heavy lifting with his arm. Once, he would’ve been able to haul Clint out with no trouble and hell, probably carry him all of the way to the damn hospital. Now, though? Now Bucky just wondered if Steve was still up and would be willing to rub at his shoulder for a while. He could never get the angle right and the metal was feeling heavier than usual, straining his trapezius muscle. He tried to push away the thought that he still thought of Steve, his 101 year old friend who actually looked and probably  _ felt  _ as old as he was, first when he wanted comfort. But it was late and he didn’t want to bother Steve or Sam for that matter, so he would just have to deal with it on his own. Like always. Feeling thoroughly wretched and not entirely sure why, Bucky stuffed his hands in his pockets and started making his way towards the exit. Clint definitely didn’t need an achy old man who flinched at loud noises waiting around for him, even if Bucky looked 25. 

“Hey, Barnes!” 

He ignored Natasha and kept heading for the exit. 

“Barnes,  _ wait _ !” A hand tugged on his sleeve and he finally stopped. 

“Sorry I stayed so long,” he said without looking at her. “I didn’t mean to intrude or anything.” 

“What are you talking about?” 

He stayed silent and tried to tug his arm out of her grip. It was stronger than he expected. 

“He wants to talk to you.” 

“Well then he’s an idiot.”

She made a sound somewhere between a snort and an incredulous laugh. “He wants to thank you. You know, for pulling him out of a dumpster and saving his life.” 

Bucky sighed. He could feel his shoulders inching up closer to his ears and he fought to look relaxed.

“Look,” said Natasha. She pulled him around to face her but Bucky didn’t take his eyes off of the floor. “Just come in and see him for five minutes and then you can go home. Please.” 

It was the please that did it. He sighed again. “Fine.” 

He let Natasha lead him by the arm back across the waiting room and through the double doors leading into the hallway beyond. The whole time a nausea inducing combination of guilt and apprehension swirled around his stomach. He was determined to keep his mouth firmly shut, otherwise who knew what would come spilling out. Words? Or Bile? 

Eventually they reached the hospital room and Natasha held the door open for him to go first. Soft voices spoke inside the room and suddenly Bucky really, really didn’t want to go in. Natasha gave him a slight push and he stumbled into the room. 

To say Clint looked like shit was putting it mildly. Most of his face was covered with a wicked bruise and it looked like every breath hurt like a bitch, but he still had a smile on his face. Matt sat in the chair by his bedside. Lucky was curled up at the foot of his bed, head nestled sympathetically on Clint’s shin and staring up at his master with big, sad eyes. Clint’s smile grew bigger when he saw Bucky stumble into the room.  

“There he is, my hero!” He said, voice sounding weak and slightly hoarse, but still said with a blinding smile. 

Something pulled viciously at his heart and Bucky quickly glanced down at the floor, hoping no one noticed the blush he could feel beginning to stain his cheeks. He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets and scuffed one foot across the floor. “It was nothing,” he mumbled.

“It was a bit more than nothing, if you ask me,” Clint said, sounding way too chipper for someone who had just gotten out of surgery. Bucky stared at the tile floor. “Um,” Clint cleared his throat. “Can you guys give us a second?” 

“Sure,” said Matt. Bucky heard him get up and the sound of two pairs of shoes against the floor while he and Natasha exited. Then it was just the two of them. 

“Oh my God,” Clint groaned and Bucky looked up sharply. What little part of his face that wasn’t covered in bruises looked drained of color as he sat back into his pillows. The smile slipped off of his face and was replaced with more of a grimace. 

Bucky moved a little closer to the bed. “You don’t want them to know how much pain you’re in?” He said it more like a statement than a question. 

“Na,” Clint replied. “Not that they couldn’t handle it, but I don’t want to worry them. You on the other hand,” he grimaced as he shifted to get more comfortable. Bucky moved over to help him rearrange his pillows into something more comfortable. “You saw me when I was literally at the bottom of a garbage heap so I don’t have to worry about you.” He smiled up at him and Bucky couldn’t help the little answering grin that formed on his lips in response. 

“Yeah, you definitely looked like shit.” 

Clint laughed. He had such nice grey eyes that Bucky found himself staring. 

“Let me take you out to dinner,” Clint said very quickly, like he wanted to get the words out as fast as possible, before Bucky could interrupt. 

He reeled back. “What?!” 

“I want to take you to dinner.”

Speechless, Bucky just stared at him with wide eyes. “You...why?”

Clint snorted. “You hauled my ass out of a dumpster. I want to take you to dinner to, you know, thank you.” It looked like a tiny bit of a flush dusted the unbruised portion of his skin. 

“Oh. No, you don’t have to do that.” Bucky crossed his arms over his chest, trying to ignore the way his heart started to pound in his chest. 

Clint set his jaw and glared at him. “I’m taking you out.”

He was way out of his depth here. He couldn’t even remember the last time that someone had wanted to spend any time with him, let alone asked him for dinner. Hanging out with Sam or Steve definitely didn’t count. But this wouldn’t be a date, right? It was just someone who wanted to thank Bucky for saving his life. He could deal with that, deal with a thank you dinner instead of a date. 

“Fine,” he said, the single word sounding a little strangled even to his ears. 

Clint’s glare melted away and was replaced with a happy smile. “Great!” He reached for the little pad of paper and pen that was on his bed stand but he couldn’t quite reach. “Ow.” 

Bucky took pity on him and grabbed the pad to hand it over. 

“No, no. Write your number down so I can call you when I get out of here.”

Oh. 

Feeling thoroughly rattled, Bucky scrawled his name and phone number on the pad before handing it over to Clint. He needed to get out of here. 

“Um, I hope you feel better,” he mumbled before he hurried out of the room. 

“Hey, wait!” Clint called out behind him, but he ignored him and high tailed it out. 

He passed Matt and Natasha at the coffee machine in the waiting room on his way out and they both called out to him, but he ignored them. He needed to not be in this hospital anymore. His nerves were completely shot to shit and if he didn’t get some air he was worried about what might happen next.  A panic attack might be the least shitty outcome out of all of this. 

Climbing onto his bike felt like a godsend. As he kicked it into gear, he tried to avoid thinking about the fact that he likely had a night out coming up with someone who made his heart stutter in his chest. 

That couldn’t end well. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Poor Bucky was a bit of a mess in this chapter.


End file.
